Try to get answers.

"Goddamn it, they're not picking up!" I angrily slammed my phone on the counter. Sheryl had her head between her hands and looked up with a snort.

"What? What. Oh, you're calling my dad? You are so sweet to talk to my parents..." she mumbled. She stared at the tiles on my countertop for a second. "Fuck, I am so high. I'm like... really high. Like, I don't even care anymore."

"Care about what?" I asked with irritation. She kept staring at the tiles so I asked again.

"...what? Oh, what do I care about. Nothing! I don't care about anything. I'm not even real and my family doesn't want me and I don't care at all..."

I pulled up a chair next to her and rubbed her back. For now, she was my best source of information.

"Ok, um, Sheryl, can I ask you a few questions?" She nodded. "How long have you been around? Not as Sheryl, but as an Emulated?"

"What's the date of today?" she mumbled.

"It's the 16th," I replied.

"I don't know. It feels like years but that's the real Sheryl. I think it's been like a week or two." She chuckled thickly. "Or three or four or five-"

"Ok," I interrupted. "I don't know how to put this politely so I'll just say it. What's wrong with you?"

She laughed and punched my arm weakly. "I don't know! I think they said it's because I was fucked up when I died." She paused. "I died, man. What the fuck? I was like, ok, and then I died, and now I'm this. I don't think I'm gonna be a very good lawyer."

As the reality set in, I was getting angrier. Angry at Sheryl's family, angry at the people who built this thing, angry at the thing itself. I closed my eyes and started to count to ten, trying to get past this unexpected rush of rage.

As I got to number 7, it did something completely unexpected. Sheryl reached across my lap and rubbed my knee. At the same time, she brought a hand up along the length of my spine to tousle my hair lightly. It was so familiar and so unexpected that it brought my train of thought to a crashing halt. This really was Sheryl. This is how she comforted me. When my cat died, when I got laid off, when my parents got divorced - she held me just like this. I immediately broke down in sobs and she pulled me close, my head against her chest.

"I missed you so much, Sher..." I sobbed. "I don't know how I'm gonna make it. I can't do it without you."

She hiccuped as she ran a hand through my hair. "It's ok, babe," she slurred. "You don't have to. I'm here. I'm here for you."

"But you're not real!" I cried, sitting up suddenly. "You're Emulated! And you're some kind of weird mutant ****-addled Emulated!"

She smiled, her eyes slightly glassy but wet with tears. She clumsily brought my hand to her chest. Her skin was impossibly soft over her low-cut blouse. "Here, feel this. Do you feel it?"

I did. "Your heart is beating."

She slid my hand farther down and I instinctively wrapped it around her warm, supple breast. I suddenly realized how lonely I'd been since she died. She thrust her chest outward into my hand and chuckled.

"You feel that?"

I swallowed and nodded. She took my hand in hers and stood. "I missed you too," she said with a crooked smile. Hand-in-hand, we walked to the back of the house where the master bedroom was.